Soldier Up by Unknown

it hard, in fact the entire family did.  Mel was almost incapacitated for a week or so, thank God for John who was so understanding and helpful to everyone in the family at that time.  He made all of the funeral arrangements, set up the wake; he did everything, most of all he held her every night she cried.
                  After her mom passed her dad was a mess, she didn’t know how he ever got along without his wife she apparently did everything for him and he pretty much over the years did nothing around the house.  His expectation now that his wife had passed that everyone in the family, especially his daughters wait on him hand and foot.  He became very disagreeable when that didn’t happen and took it out on them when they visited, tough they told him he should have learned how to take care of himself, don’t get any of them wrong, they loved their dad, but they were not going to be his personnel slave.
                  Several months after her mom passed her dad had a cardiac arrest and was hospitalized for several weeks.  He lost the use of his left side and his speech at times was incoherent the doctors said he would never fully recover and he would need care the rest of his life.  Mel, her sisters and brothers had a meeting and discussed next moves with their dad; the decision was to place him in a home where he had care 24/7.  No one wanted to take him into their home which would have potentially meant that one of them might have to quit their job to take care of him.
                  The following year he passed away in his sleep he had another cardiac arrest in the middle of the night, apparently the nursing home was downsizing personnel and didn’t have enough nurses to cover the shifts, they were over extended, the nurses complained to often to management but they never did anything about it.  Her dad died because there weren’t enough nurses available to help, unfortunately another patient had coded just before he did, and they were involved there.  When they got to him he was dead, after the shock wore off to the family they buried their father and then sued the hell out of the nursing home winning a multi-million dollar award.
                  Mel wasn’t sure if all that money was supposed to make them feel better, it didn’t, not her at least.  The money was supposed to be divided equally between all siblings, but after the award one brother and one sister demanded all of the money stating they were more equal than the others, whatever the hell that meant.  This caused a fracture within the family that they would never recover from; the money was eventually divided up equally between the siblings as well as the inheritance that was left to them which wasn’t really much.  They all thought their parents were loaded with money, it turned out that they were barely just getting by.  There three mortgages on the house and they had mountains of debt, it was odd because they exposed living within their means, but after they passed away it had become apparent they never did.
                  Life went on, the sun came up each morning and you made one step in front of the other.  Mel moved on with the help from John and the kids, she knew how blessed she was to have what she did. 

Chapter Eighteen
     
    Kai was in his first week of 5 th Grade and Morgan was in her first week of 3 rd Grade, Kai was excited about starting school, Morgan not so much.  John was on his two week deployment for the year, they were overseas some place in the world and of course he couldn’t tell her and he wouldn’t be able to contact her during this time period.
                  If there were any family emergencies they were to contact the civilian POC (point of contact) who in this case was now retired Sergeant Major Dognillo or now just Anzio Dognillo.  He did his thirty years and was forced to retire reaching the maximum number of years an